


Tiger's eye

by NyeLung



Series: Reforging Time [2]
Category: Fire Emblem Series, Fire Emblem: Fuukasetsugetsu | Fire Emblem: Three Houses
Genre: Felix is autistic headcanons, Fire Emblem Rare Pair Exchange Christmas Edition, I basically got three idiots who aren't good with feelings for different reasons, Indech is there but he uses a different name, Indech's 1A+ courtship advice, M/M, Some mentions of blood, a bisexual disaster in love with a gay disaster gets advice from an aroace disaster, although Glenn is alive in this, idiots to lovers, minor appearances of Flayn and Macuil, no beta we die like Glenn, spoilers for Jeritza's past
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-01-03
Updated: 2020-01-03
Packaged: 2021-02-19 05:43:45
Rating: Mature
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 3,164
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/22106020
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/NyeLung/pseuds/NyeLung
Summary: Jeritza sees Felix smile and for some reason he doesn't understand, he really wants Felix to smile at him. His adoptive father Fomor has some suggestions but none of them seem to work. Also, it's not like Jeritza wants to do the courtship thing with kissing and ... mating. He just wants Felix to smile, preferably at him.
Relationships: Felix Hugo Fraldarius/Jeritza von Hrym
Series: Reforging Time [2]
Series URL: https://archiveofourown.org/series/1588987
Comments: 2
Kudos: 20
Collections: Fire Emblem Rare Pair Christmas Exchange 2019





	Tiger's eye

**Author's Note:**

  * For [Narina](https://archiveofourown.org/users/Narina/gifts).



> This is part of a bigger AU which will be written more about in Light of the Fell Star. Basically what you need to know is that Sothis is running around in this AU and fixes stuff. For example saving Jeritza from his family before he goes completely haywire. The big tiddy brothers of Zanado (Cichol, Macuil and Indech) are in the monastery and there's twin Byleths (Sirius and Byleth). Ah, and Glenn is alive.

### Tiger's eye

Jeritza had never felt so helpless as in this moment when he was sitting over his essay for his Faith magic class. This wasn't even because he sucked at Faith magic which he very much did but because he had seen Felix Hugo Fraldarius smile at something and for reasons Jeritza didn't understand, he wanted Felix to smile more and maybe even at him.

He had wanted to befriend the sword fighting student for a while now but this new feeling wasn't wanting to be friends. He knew what wanting to be friends felt like and it didn't make his heart flutter or his blood stir in his veins. This was different and Jeritza didn't know what to do about it. Maybe he was just sick.

With a sigh he turned his gaze back to his essay which still stood at as many words as before: none. This would take for forever. Maybe he should give in, forget his pride and ask Linhardt.

It had taken Jeritza all afternoon and a good portion of his evening to figure out that essay - even after asking Linhardt for help. Now that he had managed that, though, he was back to feeling helpless over the mystery of Felix Hugo Fraldarius. He had never wanted anyone to smile at him in that way. Never.

"What's on your mind, Jeritza?", his father Fomor asked.

"Hmm?", Jeritza made, still thinking about Felix and that damned smile.

"You've been staring at your late night snack for an hour now. Even I notice that something is up then." Fomor wasn't the best with humans but if Jeritza had really been that obvious, then, yes, even his adoptive father would notice. "You know, you got the same look about you that Seteth had when he first met his wife - I shouldn't have said that."

"Seteth was married?", Jeritza asked incredulously. "Your brother Seteth was married?"

Fomor tried very hard not to look at Jeritza.

"I knew he was old but I didn't think he was that old", Jeritza mumbled.

"You shouldn't tell him that", Fomor said with a bit of laughter in his voice. "He always grew disgruntled when one of us mentioned that he was the oldest."

"Hmmm." Jeritza had been Fomor's adoptive son for a few years now but he still didn't exactly belong to the family of green-haired mysteries. He guessed that was mostly the case because Seteth as well as Rhea and Danann were very secretive and reserved towards strangers and to them Jeritza was a stranger. Fomor was different but maybe that was only because Sithos - who also was somehow related to Fomor and his siblings - had put Jeritza in his care.

"What I meant to say, you look just like Seteth when he fell in love."

Jeritza blinked.

Fomor smiled in a way that was supposed to cheer Jeritza up.

Jeritza blinked again.

"Love?", he asked.

"Yes, you know, love. When humans go all stupid in the head and want to do the kissing and the ... er, you know, mating." There was a blush rising in Fomor's cheeks now. "That's what Seteth did at least as far as I know."

Jeritza raised both his eyebrows to convey his scepticism. "I don't want to do the kissing and the mating. I just... I want him to smile at me."

"Oh", made Fomor.

"Yes", said Jeritza. "It's nothing like that."

"You just want him to smile?", Fomor asked with a hint of something in his eyes that Jeritza couldn't decipher. "Maybe you should gift him something. I heard humans like that."

Jeritza considered that. Everyone liked gifts, didn't they? Yes, giving a gift was a logically sound thing to do to get a smile. "Alright. What does one usually give as a gift then?" After all, Jeritza had never given anyone a gift before.

Fomor stayed quiet for a long time.

"You don't know either, father?", Jeritza asked and felt the helplessness return.

"I never really was one for all that... stuff." Fomor seemed just as helpless as Jeritza felt. "I guess some shiny stone? Everyone likes shiny stones as a gift."

Jeritza had browsed the markets of Garreg Mach outside the monastery for a shiny stone after having found none in the monastery itself that weren't part of religious jewellery or items. He had, admittedly, thought about taking one of those as a gift but Sithos had given him a stern talking to, so he had left it at that and gone to the markets instead.

After nearly giving up in the markets, he had found a stall of a cheerful, red headed merchant called Anna. She had a collection of shiny stones for sale and Jeritza let his hand slide through the polished stones in the basket. They were cool and smooth against his fingers but non of them were the right kind of shiny. That was, until he saw one that was different. He picked it up and held it into the light where it shimmered enticingly.

"The people of Brigid call this a tiger's eye", the merchant Anna supplied.

"A tiger's eye?", Jeritza asked, looking at the gleaming stone with layers of brown and yellow. It did look somewhat like an eye, he guessed.

"Never been to Brigid, have you?", the merchant teased. "A tiger is a dangerous predator with eyes of gleaming gold that roams the jungles of Brigid. It's said to kill with its pounce alone. They call it the king of the jungle."

Jeritza thought of Felix' sword technique, of his gait and the way his eyes had lightened up when he smiled. "This will fit perfectly", he said. "How much for the stone?"

The merchant's face brightened with a pearly white smile. "It is a gift then? May I suggest to bind it into a leather cord then for the low price of just two more coins?"

That sounded very reasonable to Jeritza, so he nodded and watched with great fascination as Anna bound, braided and knotted three leather strings into a cord with the tiger's eye at it's centre. He paid without another word and left with his gift.

"Pleasure doing business with you", the merchant beamed as Jeritza left.

Back in the monastery, Jeritza figured out that he had no idea how to give his gift to Felix. After careful consideration and without any helpful epiphanies, Jeritza decided to just go up to Felix and give it to him directly.

"Hey, erm, Felix", he tried to get the sword fighter's attention.

"What do you want?" Felix let his gaze roam over Jeritza. "You're an Eagle student."

"And you're with the Lions. I don't see how that matters", Jeritza answered.

"So what the fuck do you want with me?", Felix asked with quite the amount of irritation in his voice.

Jeritza held out the leather necklace with the tiger's eye. "I got you this."

"A necklace?" Felix took it from Jeritza's hand. "It's... nice. I guess."

He had a lot of thoughts running through his head on how to answer. "It reminded me of your eyes when you smiled", Jeritza blurted out instead.

Felix still looked at the necklace. "So you bought it as a gift for me?"

"Well, everyone loves gifts, don't they?", Jeritza shrugged.

"I don't get you", Felix said, eyes still pointedly directed at the necklace. "We're not even in the same house and you just give me a gift? What's your angle? I'm not the heir to House Fraldarius and there's nothing to gain from befriending me."

Jeritza had never been good at lying, so he didn't try it now either. "I wanted to see you smile again."

Felix shook his head. "I really don't get you." Now Felix actually made a point to look at Jeritza. "But, thank you. I guess. I don't really need a necklace, but it's nice."

"So, how did it go?", Fomor asked in the evening.

"He said it was nice", Jeritza reported, still somewhat disappointed. "But he didn't smile."

Fomor hummed. "Maybe something different then? Also, did you really think about ripping off one of the jewels in the church?", he asked with a smile.

Jeritza felt a blush rising in his cheek. "... Maybe."

Jeritza tried flowers next which didn't go down well at all.

"There's still roots on the flowers. Did you just rip them out of their place? You should better put them back before Dedue sees this."

Jeritza tried a sweet cake that his mother used to make when he was small and it always made him smile. It didn't work on Felix.

"I don't like cake. ... Maybe give it Ashe. He likes sweets."

Jeritza tried a bright, colourful feather that was sharpened to a fine point.

"Hmm, could be useful for writing. Thank you."

Jeritza tried fish after Fomor insisted on it which ended with Felix looking about ready to throw hands.

"Who the fuck gifts raw fish?"

"I think, we might be going about this wrong", Fomor said after Jeritza reported his latest failure. "Maybe humans don't court with gifts."

"I wasn't courting", Jeritza immediately protested but his protest wasn't as strong as on the first day.

Fomor raised an eyebrow. "So you don't want to hold him in your arms and just talk with him until the moon sinks behind the horizon? You don't want to see life through his eyes? You don't want to fight side by side with him?"

Jeritza thought about that for a moment. "Well, I do, but that has nothing to do with courtship. No kissing and no mating."

"Now, you see", Fomor said, "my first guess might have been wrong but I talked to some people and apparently there's a lot of different kinds of courtship out there and the kissing and the mating is only one kind of those. Soth- Sithos said that love comes in many shapes and forms. There's not only the kissing and mating love or the family love but many, many more and, to be completely honest, I didn't understand the next parts either but what I mean to say is that you are in love with that Fraldarius boy."

Jeritza blinked. He couldn't remember his father ever having spoken so many words at once.

"Sithos also suggested that you might want to spar with the Fraldarius boy. He's supposed to be a great sword fighter and you could learn from him."

"You really told her everything, father?" Jeritza felt a hint of embarrassment at that.

"You tried to steal from the church. I had to when she asked me about it." Fomor shrugged his shoulders. "Flayn mentioned that Felix is at the training ground. She came here just before you returned."

"You told Flayn, too?"

Felix was at the training ground. He tried to talk Sirius into training with him. Jeralt's son didn't seem to be in the mood, though, which made it even worse when his eyes lightened up as he saw Jeritza.

"I'm not the only one who learnt from the Blade Breaker", Sirius said now. "Jeritza here trained with my father, too."

Oh no. No. Jeritza was not- Actually. This was perfect. "I did. I never attained Sirius' and Byleth's grace with the sword but I am good with a lance."

It seemed to Jeritza that this was the first time Felix actually looked at him. Then a thin smile appeared on the sword fighter's lips. It wasn't the full smile he had seen first which had started all this but it was a beginning and it made Jeritza's heart flutter all over again. "Very well. If you really learnt from the Blade Breaker as well, you should be a worthy opponent."

The training went rather well. Felix showed him some tricks with the sword and Jeritza instead taught him how he wielded the lance and how to fight it with a sword. It was quite harmonious and it would have gone even better, had Jeritza not in this moment remembered the words Fomor had said about different kinds of love and the likes. That let his concentration slip for just the blink of an eye.

It was long enough for Felix to hit him and since they had changed the training weapons for sharper, properly balanced ones, it drew blood.

That was pretty much all Jeritza remembered. It had always been like that as far as he could think back. As soon as he was hurt, he blacked out and when he came back... well. Bad things happened while he blacked out.

The fear of seeing Felix dead made him hesitate to open his eyes once he came back to his senses. He was breathing heavily. His whole body was aching and he could taste blood in his mouth. He dreaded to open his eyes after he catalogued his body's aches.

Jeritza heard someone groan in pain. Not himself. Someone else. He forced his eyes open.

Felix was lying on the training ground. He was bleeding. Heavily. His sword was broken just as the lance that Jeritza had used to train with him. Actually, there was an unholy amount of blood on the ground.

"Oh no", he stammered. "I'm sorry. I'm so sorry. I didn't want that. I didn't..." He fell down to his knees next to Felix. "I'm so sorry."

Felix coughed up a bit of blood. "Heh. Don't you want to get a healer?" He coughed again. "I'm kind of badly wounded."

"Yes, yes, a healer." Jeritza was still stammering and his thoughts were running wild in his head but Felix' voice enabled him to somewhat organize the chaos. A healer, yes. He was about to get up when he remembered one little detail. Though he wasn't very good at it, he also was able to heal due to the crest of Lamine and his blood.

"What the fuck?", he heard Felix exclaim while he channelled all of his concentration and magic into the only healing spell he ever learnt. Felix probably was surprised because Jeritza's crest had started to glow. "I didn't know you could heal."

"I'm not very good at it", Jeritza admitted while his energy flowed into the wounded structures of Felix' body and mended broken blood vessels and bones. "But you should live long enough so that Manuela can patch you up."

"I also didn't know you had a crest of Lamine."

"I... don't like to talk about it." Jeritza felt his breathing getting more laboured. He looked down at himself and noticed with quite some surprise that he also was wounded in more than one place.

"Your name isn't Jeritza, is it?" Felix coughed but it sounded better now. "Mercedes once talked about her half brother."

Jeritza shook his head. "That's not me. I'm Jeritza, son of Fomor and student of the Black Eagles."

Before Felix could answer again, the gate to the training ground burst open to reveal a very concerned Fomor and Flayn as well as Danann.

"What the fuck happened here? I thought they would be fucking."

"Not the words I would have used", Fomor answered Danann, "but my thoughts exactly."

To say that Manueala wasn't amused to patch up two patients who shouldn't have trained with sharp weapons anyway, was an understatement and she made clear what she thought of the two of them. Still, she healed everything that Jeritza and Flayn hadn't healed at first, so that was something. She also ordered them to stay in the patients' beds or she would "so help her Seiros" chain them down. Then she left them alone, in beds next to each other after Jeritza had nearly killed Felix. Jeritza didn't think that was one of her better ideas but he couldn't exactly say anything after he had agreed to training with sharp weapons.

"I guess you have questions", he said after Manuela had left.

"Many", Felix admitted. "First of them would be: What the fuck happened?"

Jeritza had dreaded that question but he probably should answer it after nearly killing Felix. "I blacked out. It happened before when I was on a battlefield and my people said that I turned into a berserk after I was wounded. I don't really remember anything of those phases."

To Jeritza's surprise, Felix snorted at that. "I knew that I wouldn't get you but this really... you know how you react to blood and still trained with me with sharp weapons?"

"I thought it would only happen on battlefields", Jeritza defended himself. "That's why Fomor trained me with the bow. So I could fight without being on the frontlines but... I wanted to train with you."

"You wanted to train with me?", Felix echoed.

Jeritza felt a blush creeping up his face. He was suddenly glad that Felix didn't much look at him while they talked. "Fomor suggested it. No, actually, Sithos suggested it to Fomor who then said I should spar with you."

"Does this have anything to do with all those gifts you tried to give me?" Felix' bed creaked.

Jeritza tried to sit up so as to get a look at Felix. It hurt a bit and he would probably be chided by Manuela for it but he got a look at Felix and that was worth it. Felix was beaten and battered but he was very much alive and that made Jeritza feel better already. He also noticed - "You kept the necklace?"

For the first time since Jeritza had laid eyes on him, Felix Hugo Fraldarius blushed. "It was nice and it helped me calm down. I like smooth stones."

"That's good." Jeritza looked down at his hands on the blanket. "And the sparring had to do with the gifts."

"Ingrid insisted they were courtship gifts", Felix said and there was something in his voice that made Jeritza look up again.

"They were", he admitted very quietly and very, very carefully. "In a way. I wanted you to smile at me."

"Oh." Felix stayed quiet for a while. "Does that mean we have to kiss now?"

Jeritza looked down at his again for a second time. "I guess? But I don't really want to."

For a second time Felix couldn't answer because a door burst open. This time to reveal a furious Manuela. "You! Lie down! And you! No more talking! I had to patch you both up to your bones, so you will lie still for at least one night!"

Jeritza let himself fall down onto the mattress and flinched in pain. Well deserved pain.

"And no kissing!", Manuela added less furious before she left.

"Good", Felix said quietly once Manuela was gone.

"I don't want to kiss you", Jeritza added onto that, "but I want to fight side by side with you. I want to see the world through your eyes and I want to hold you in my arms and talk until the moon sinks behind the horizon."

Felix hummed in agreement. "I could get behind that. Just never train with me again."

**Author's Note:**

> I read that headcanon about how Felix is an autistic coded character and it wouldn't leave me. I'm not autistic myself (although I am neurodivergent in similar ways) so if there is something seriously off the spectrum, tell me and I'll do my best to fix it.  
> Also, Indech is Fomor whose name is derived from the Fomorians who Indech was a king of in Mythology. Same goes for Macuil whose name is derived from Mac Cuill who was a hero or something of the Thuata de Danann.  
> As for Jeritza and Felix: I'm pretty sure they will try the kissing at least once and will not be into it (which is heavily inspired by my own romantic endeavours). They will also do the dating and they will figure out what gifts the other likes. There will be more talking about Jeritza's problem and it will take some time until Felix has worked through that completely because it also reminds him of Dimitri who is not an orphan in this AU but he still goes a bit berserk when he's fighting. And they will work through the whole thing of Jeritza being Emile but also not because he's left Emile behind. He's not that broken boy any longer. At least most of the time.


End file.
